


Mend

by Quillfiend



Category: Warhammer 40.000
Genre: F/M, Magic, Mechanicus, Tech Priest, Thousand Sons, psyker
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-17
Updated: 2020-04-17
Packaged: 2021-03-01 18:07:09
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,586
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23701291
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Quillfiend/pseuds/Quillfiend
Summary: A little in-between chapter that would fit somewhere after the first half of Ahriman: Exiled. I really enjoyed the interactions of Ahriman and the ship mistress and decided to write up a little experimental thing.
Relationships: Ahriman/Carmenta
Comments: 5
Kudos: 20





	Mend

„Ahriman?“

There were no days in the deep, dark void of space, no change to mark the passing of time, and yet the last few hours felt remarkably similar to how cold summer nights did back on Terra. For the first time in years Ahriman allowed his mind to just wander aimlessly, drowning in nostalgia and homesick woes. While not ready to turn his mind eye back towards the path ahead just yet, he was nonetheless glad that the ship mistress pulled him out of his somber musings.

„Mistress?“ he answered, his voice echoing through the hallway he was walking. Carmenta was nowhere to be seen, instead using the closest vox to call out to him; she was the ship and the ship was her, and he knew now that she could at any time tell where within her bowels he was.

_Are we like parasites within the Titan Child, I wonder?_

„Come to the bridge,“ Carmenta's voice was weak, quiet, „if you will.“

„Is there a problem?“

He received no answer, and without pressing the ship mistress for one, he hastened his pace. He sensed no perils of the Warp within the ship's bowels - none aside from Astraeos' cursed brother. If there was danger, it came from without, and that was a grave omen.

He expected to find the Librarian and his brothers at the ship's command where Carmenta had called him, but the bridge was empty, hosting none but him and the tech-witch. Carmenta sat slumped on the metal floor, leaning against the command throne; she looked like a shadow melding in with it in her dark robes. A branching delta of cords and cables enveloped her, connecting her to the machine spirit of the _Titan Child._

„I am sorry if I disturbed you,“ Carmenta's voice clicked, strained, „I have... A question. I must ask you something. I must know.“

Ahriman began walking towards her in slow strides. Her mind was melting, struggling to keep control over the warship without being swallowed whole. The trip into the Eye of Terror took much out of her, and the sorcerer felt a pang of guilt.

_They were right. You destroy all you touch._

„You've seen more than any of us,“ Carmenta whispered when he knelt down beside her collapsed body, „beyond... This. Beyond life.“

„No.“ His voice was soft, gentle. He knew what she wanted to ask; he knew she wanted to ask what awaited her in the afterlife, but even he in his wisdom could not peer so deep. „I am sorry, Carmenta.“

She turned her head, and he could see a dark mixture of blood and oil soaking the collar of her robe. „Will I become a demon after this is over?“

He took her mechanical hand in his own, sending a wave of warmth through cold steel. „You will not. I promise you.“

The green bionic lenses she replaced her eyes with long ago were set on him, unmoving. There was a brilliant mind behind them, one that was wasting away quicker that it needed to, all thanks to Ahriman. Carefully pushing his hands around and through the cables binding Carmenta to the _Titan Child,_ the sorcerer lifted the ship mistress' nigh weightless body and pressed it against his own, letting her rest in his lap. His fingers trailed across her limp form to search for any damage he could repair.

„You've been kind to me,“ she wheezed, „Ahriman.“

Her wounds resisted him, and he realized her body was reflecting the damage the _Titan Child_ sustained during its venture into the Realm of Chaos.

„Can you... Stop the pain?“ Carmenta pleaded quietly. To treat her frail body was of no use, and so Ahriman began expanding his mind to touch the _Titan Child's_ furthest peripheries. The tower ridge crowning the warship was singed, its Geller fields badly damaged from the daemonic incursion. The hull was in a bad shape, and so was one of the ship's reactors, but Ahriman lacked the means to repair any of it. Instead he let his mind enter the wiring that connected the damaged parts to the rest of the _Titan Child_ and cut the link; he knew that Carmenta would find a way to renew the connection, but for now the ship mistress breathed a sigh of relief. It... Felt better than Ahriman thought it would.

„Ahriman,“ Carmenta whispered when he began retracting his psychic presence from within the ship's bowels; her mechanical hand clutched the sigil-coated cloak he wore over his power armor. There was a dire need behind her gesture, though it was not driven by pain. He leaned down, bringing his face closer to her machine visage, and touched her surface thoughts, so closely interlinked with the ship's. What he found was a strange amalgamation of human emotion and machine whirr, though interpreting its desire was hardly difficult. His power surged again, touching the machinery that laced the entire ship. Carmenta relented her hold on his robe, her head slowly tilting backwards. A faint smile crept across his face, accompanied by a knowing squint. He pulled her barely human body even closer so that he could carefully observe any shifts in it and let his psychic power surge; he was no longer a cautious mender, but rather an oppressive force pressing against the ship's flanks from within. Carmenta shivered within his arms, her mechadendrites twitching; a couple of sparks ran up the many cables linking her to the _Titan Child._ Ahriman took a deep breath and focused his mental imprint to be a precise tool rather than a crushing wave; it split into currents of power that found their way into every crevice of the massive warship, touching all the far corners of the _Titan Child,_ every malfunctioning port and every little blinking light. The more his psychic force filled the ship the more shallow Carmenta's breathing became; Ahriman touched her surface thoughts once more and let the feelings within become his own, a burning haze that blurred his senses. It made control of the vast psychic field more difficult, but he did not mind overmuch, not when he could feel the ship mistress's delight in turn.

To help himself with a gesture like the wizards of old used to do, Ahriman raised one of his hands and turned his wrist in a motion copied by his expanded mind. There wasn't a single nook his presence did not reach, and now it shifted so that it could not only press the _Titan Child_ from within _,_ but glide against its walls. The techpriestess felt every ripple, clasping her mechadendrites firmly onto the command deck railing so that they would stop spasming.

„What are you doing to my ship?“ she whimpered, „what are you doing to _me?“_

„Should I stop?“

„No,“ Carmenta said quickly, clutching his collar, „don't you dare.“

Ahriman smiled again, halfly in response to her command and halfly for the joy using his powers brought him; he had to open many a door he thought closed to him forever now, adding to his psychic pool and demonstrating the true potential of an ancient sorcerer. Better yet, none of this was used for destruction, and funneling his power towards something _positive_ reminded him of the brighter days of his youth, back when his magic spread glee rather than sowed misery.

„Ahriman,“ Carmenta's voice quivered as her body did; to hear his own name uttered not in fear, hatred or anger but tentative yearning was soothing, liberating. He clung to the sensation as he thickened his psychic field, slowing the friction but increasing its intensity; his power oozed from every single inch of the ship, enveloped its entirety like an invisible, choking foil. It writhed and caressed and squeezed, shifted and twisted and teased the cold shell of the _Titan Child,_ and the tech-witch linked to it felt every single of his mental ventures and maneuvers. The sound of creaking metal filled the command deck as her powerful mechadendrites began bending the railing they were grasping onto; her heavily augmented body struggled to control the staggering intensity of sensations that washed over her in drowning waves. She opened her mouth to call out to the magus again, but all that came out was a muted _beep_ that faded into a barely audible moan. Flesh and machine tensed and squirmed in unison; Ahriman held the ship mistress fast for the entirety of her biotech euphoria, losing himself in the cacophony of clicks, beats, sighs and purrs. Only when Carmenta's body slowly became limp within his arms once again did he dare to loosen his psychic hold over her extended self, the sprawling chambers of the _Titan Child._

Though her inhuman face barely gave away anything, her thoughts radiated relief, and confusion, and vulnerability. Her mechadendrites let go of the metal railing, now miserably bent and twisted, and slumped to the ground. Neither of them said anything, for no words were needed. Not until Astraeos stormed the command room, demanding an explanation for the sudden psychokinetic invasion of his spaces.

„Repairs,“ Carmenta said then, leaving the rest to Astraeos' imagination. Ahriman, no more inclined to fill in the blank spaces, lifted her up and handed her into the care of her throne. A single uncertain glance of her mechanical eyes bored into him before a waterfall of cables and wires swallowed her in her entirety.

_Ahriman,_ her voice still echoed in his mind, a gentle whisper of the last soul that did not wish him dead, _Ahriman..._


End file.
